


The Road Home

by heartstone



Category: TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works & Related Fandoms, The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Guilt, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Vulnerability
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-08
Updated: 2020-06-08
Packaged: 2021-03-03 19:35:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 631
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24610888
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heartstone/pseuds/heartstone
Summary: And he doesn't mean to, doesn't even need to try: but when he pulls away from his Maia it is violent and a bruise is left over the arm of his Awakening.***
Relationships: Morgoth Bauglir | Melkor/Sauron | Mairon
Comments: 7
Kudos: 38





	The Road Home

The world is still dark when Melkor wakes but within his arms is dawn-break, as if he had collected the first honey-thick streams of light in the great encircling of his arms, cupping tenderly the lovely blossom of gold chrysanthemum sun: his sleeping Maia. 

For just a moment he forgets himself in that sweet rush of thoughtless presence, of the rhythm of Mairon's breath all the summer breezes, the nectarine-peach of his hair fall over cinnamon skin flushed with the rose-blooms of his dreams. He forgets his fear of holding something incomprehensibly _precious_ _,_ of his anxieties weighing on him like millions of fallen petals:

_he-loves-me-he-loves-me-not._

Melkor simply cradles him, submerged in the blessing of his heart's ephemeral peace: that feeling of gratitude one glimpses sometimes of the fragile gift of existence. Of the red-gold light of home-earth and life-fire and sea-longing and sky-wonder.

But then he recalls himself: the cruelest fate is his

_consciousness_

and his vicious inadequacy, his crudeness as a destroyer of the golden lovely chrysanthemum-sun.

And he doesn't mean to, doesn't even need to try: but when he pulls away from his Maia it is violent and a bruise is left over the arm of his Awakening. _(It is as if to say that he had been there, that he had touched that spot...)_ To Melkor it is much the same as the crushed-petal smell of sweet decay, of humid petrichor, of a nauseous legacy of unsuccessful weed-pulling that tears out the entire garden.

It is so quiet and still that he can hear his hatred for his own hope that Mairon had somehow noticed those raw moments they both shared between sleep and wakefulness wherein his soul yearned forever to stray among the landscape of the Maia's radiance, those crystallized notes of amber. But Mairon's drowsy voice speaking his name 

_Melkor?_

softly is much the same to him as the hand caressing his back: gentle and too much for him to perceive all at once. Like water flowing over a wound, Mairon was a coolness like fire, reminding his broken skin of blood-loss and the searching edge of a knife which told him that he was not inviolable, even should he wield a knife himself on each of his fingers.

It is an instinct for him, to pull away, to hide the flinch his flesh betrayed by the heavenly sensation of openness, of letting his blood spill out in a way he cannot trust. _(Mairon's voice is violence of another kind and yet it bruises all the same...)_ It is for Mairon's own good, it is always for his own good. That is Melkor's lie, one he cuts himself with again and again, a desperate murder-suicide.

What Melkor fears most is this:

it is only him alone now to weather the elements, the cold mourning mists and tired rain-stained soul and charred-black hands trembling as the warmth of his white-marble skin recalls the native coldness of stone. A sea of chrysanthemum-sun petals curled at his lamed feet. Mairon is gone and it was all a just hopeless delusion.

What Melkor means is:

he doesn't know how to say he is sorry, doesn't know how to speak softly without lies. His fear chokes him mercilessly, wants to blame everything but himself for the decay that he represents. For his self-hate that became world-hate.

What Melkor does is:

turn around, marvels that his chrysanthemum-sun Maia is still there. What do those eyes see at dawn-break, looking down upon the scarred and barren earth? What life-force is brave enough to unfold honey-thick streams for him again and again?

"Please don't," Melkor whispers. It is the closest he can get to 

_the truth_

so that when he reaches out to touch Mairon again he tries his best not to pull away.

**Author's Note:**

> Tracklist:  
> Silent Hill 2 OST by Akira Yamaoka: "Forest" and "The Day of Night."  
> Darkwood OST by Artur Kordas: "Last Hideout" and "The Road Home," the latter of which this work gets its name.  
> ***


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